National Sunglasses Day

Since breaking into the league in 2009, Cutch has always had a sense of joy and swag wherever he played.

Here are a few cards featuring Cutch wearing sunglasses.

First I am going to show off an original piece of artwork by the extremely talented artist Josh Trout

2022 has seen my favorite low budget insert in a long time. Check out those shades!

2021 had an insert set called Stars in Service showing athletes in the community.

It also had a base card featuring Cutch sliding to make a catch for his base card in Series 2.

2020 introduced the world to a worldwide pandemic and the coolest sports card ever produced.

2019 Stadium Club had a photo variant of Cutch 

2016 Topps Triple Threads featured images of Cutch at the 2015 All Star Game

This is an original art card by Brian Kong and was used to produce the Museum Canvas Collection reprints from this original artwork. 

2014 Topps Archives 

2013 Topps Archives All Stars

2013 had photo variants of the top stars sporting their sunglasses.  The most famous is the Yu Darvish card featuring a pair of sunglasses that should be sent back in time.

2012 had a photo variant of Cutch at the All Star Game

2011 Tier One had an autograph with Adam Jones where Cutch is sporting shades atop his cap.

2005 Bowman Heritage saw him sport a pair of shades on his cap for the base, mini, and mahogany parallels.  It is strange That the photo variant doesn't feature sunglasses on the cap as it was likely from the same photo shoot.

It also saw the 2005 Bowman Heritage Signs of Greatness autographs to feature the sunglasses on the hat.

2005 Topps Chrome saw Cutch wearing the shades atop his head.

Do you have any sunglasses cards to show off? We could do a blog bat around if so.

Belated Star Trek Day

Star Trek

To boldly go where no man hs gone before...

Even if that means going back a day from the future.

Yup, I forgot to tie in a Star Trek Day post yesterday because quite frankly I had no idea such a thing existed. 

Star Trek Day is celebrated every September 8th in memory of it's original airing on September 8th, 1966.

I was never a big Star Trek fan.  

Star Wars was more my thing.

Truth be told though the Alien and Predator film franchises are my true Sci-Fi loves.

To celebrate (a day late) Star Trek Day I thought I would look at some Andrew McCutchen cards in my collection that tie into the Star Trek Mythos.

Let's get started with an actress I have neglected from including as part of my SaveSecondBase event.  I am talking about Jeri Ryan who plays the Borg drone character, 7 of 9 on the show Star Trek: Voyager.

7 of 9

You may recall that a few years ago I attempted to make a Frankenset of Andrew McCutchen cards numbered to 9 copies as part of Daniel's 9 year blogging anniversary contest.  I couldn't quite fulfil that request because I was missing a 7/9.

That all changed when one follower on Twitter hit me up that he had pulled a Cutch 2020 Triple Threads gold parallel numbered...

7 of 9.

Speaking of 9, there was a series called Star Trek: Deep Space Nine that ran for 3 seasons from 1993 to 1995.

This September 8, 2014 issue of Sports Illustrated features Cutch on the cover and the main article is called Andrew McCutchen Goes Deep.

Star Trek debuted in 1966 and Cutch has been featured on several 1966 Topps designed cards.

The 2015 Topps Heritage design used the 1966 Topps design and pictured above is a 3 card advertising panel found in the box toppers.

Star Trek: The Next Generation followed up the success of the original Star Trek and it debuted September 1987.  Now I could easily show off some of the 1987 designed cards I have, but I'm going to boldly go beyond and show off one of my favorite Superfractors in my collection.

Above are the 2015 Topps Finest Generations red parallel /5 and Superfractor 1/1.  These cards pop!!!!

So there are some of my Cutch cards and magazine article that I could tie into some Star Trek items.

What is your favorite Sci-Fi franchise?

Do you like Star Trek?

Miggy, Miggy, Miggy can't you see...

500 career home runs!

Congrats Miggy!

Which active players do you think will one day join the 500 HR club?

Into The Corn!!!

When I was younger my best friend's favorite baseball team was the Chicago White Sox.  The ChiSox were a team I liked a lot also due to the Big Hurt, Robin Ventura, and Jack McDowell.  

I chose to root for the other black uniformed baseball team and the rest is kind of history.  

The Pirates have stunk for nearly 3 decades.

The White Sox have basically stunk during that time also besides a few playoff appearances and of course their 2005 World Series.

The Field of Dreams Game just ended with an epic walkoff by Tim Anderson.

Man was that awesome!!!

The first homerun hit in an MLB game in the state of Iowa was by Jose Abreu.

I will be rooting for the White Sox for the American League.  What a fun group of guys they have there.

I don't have many White Sox cards in my collection that feature Cutch, but I do have a 2020 Topps Sticker with Cutch on the front and the walk off hero, Tim Anderson on the back.

It's always fun to show off the images of a card via a mirror to show the fronts and back.

I also have a card with a bunch of patches including one of Jose Abreu.  It also has a nice patch of the other 9th inning (could have been) hero, Giancarlo Stanton.

I have a feeling I will be showing off the above card again in the near future when Miggy hits career HR #500.

Did you watch the Field of Dreams game?

Just another Mini Monday

Well, it's been a busy day so I had to post this card in the final minutes (posted 11:45pm) to get the Mini Monday streak started again.

Today's mini is a 2014 Bowman Chrome mini die cut Refractor

Numbered to only 150 copies

The back of the card mentions Cutch's attempt to get a third straight OPS over .900.  Cutch would not only be successful in hitting that mark, but he would actually lead the majors with a .952 OPS and again finish 3rd in MVP voting behind Clayton Kershaw and Giancarlo Stanton.

Superman Day

Every June 12th is celebrated as National Superman Day.

You may recall I discussed this day back in 2019 when I showed off a super rare 1 of 1 autograph booklet letter patch card.  

I was never a huge fan of Superman compared to other superheroes.  I always liked the darker more angsty heroes like Wolverine, Green Arrow, or Batman or I liked the comical heroes like Flash or Deadpool.

I do respect Superman though.  He is an American icon.

Superman is also known as The Man of Steel.

Here are some other Men of Steel from my Andrew McCutchen Triple Threads collection

Just Another Mini Monday, I could've posted this on Sunday....

I think I may be on to a new theme...

Mini Mondays

Anyone else on board?

If you want to see a mini card each Monday for the forseeable future, leave a comment below.

Above is the 2014 Topps Gypsy Queen mini leather 1/1.   

By the way, Andrew McCutchen scored his 1,000th career run yesterday along with hitting his 350th career double.  

Pirates of the Past

I thought it might be fun to look at cards that feature Andrew McCutchen with former teammates and do a "Where are they now?" type thing.

I got the idea from one of those ads that takes a look at a movie cast to see where they are now.  It was followed by watching the Friends Reunion show with Ms. CollectingCutch as we saw the faces of Matthew Perry, Courtney Cox, etc in their current appearance.

So the first person I am going to look at is Gerrit Cole. 

Gerrit Cole was drafted by the Yankees in the first round of the 2009 amateur draft, but chose not to sign and instead attended UCLA where he was drafted 1st overall by the Pirates in 2011.

Cole made his debut in 2013 and helped to push the Pirates towards their first playoff run in over two decades.  

He joined a young Pirates team loaded with talent that included the 2013 NL MVP (Andrew McCutchen) and the 2013 NL Home Run Champion (Pedro Alvarez)

Cole finished his rookie season going 10-7 with a 3.22 ERA over 19 games started.  He also went 1-1 with a 2.45 ERA and 0.64WHIP over 11 innings in the 2013 Postseason.

The following season saw the Pirates make another playoff push and finish with the top Wild Card position. Cole went 11-5 with a 9K/9 and 3.23FIP in his sophomore season.  The Pirates lost the Wild Card Game and Cole didn't get a chance to pitch in the postseason.  Meanwhile McCutchen continued to be a perennial MVP candidate (finishing 3rd in MVP voting) and helped anchor one of the best outfields in baseball.

The Pirates began 2015 the same way they finished 2014, as one of the youngest and best teams in baseball.  The young team constantly flirted with the best record in baseball behind their division rivals, St. Louis Cardinals.

Gerrit Cole emerged as a true ace of the Pirates pitching staff (that also included AJ Burnett, Charlie Morton, Francisco Liriano and saw top prospects Jameson Taillon and Tyler Glasnow continue to rise in the minors).

Gerrit Cole received Cy Young votes (finishing fourth) and MVP votes while making his first All-Star team.

Cole was joined on the roster by MVP caliber Centerfielder, Andrew McCutchen along with rotation mate, AJ Burnett, and team closer Mark Melancon.

The 2015 Pirates finished with the second best record in baseball, but would again lose the Wild Card game. Cole started the game and was the losing pitcher.

The 2016 Pirates saw some significant changes occur.  Previous year rookie of year nominee (finished third) Jung Ho Kang struggled with injuries.  Andrew McCutchen had the worse season of his career after four straight top 5 MVP seasons.  Cole regressed significantly after a breakout 2015 campaign and suffered a 7-10 record, largely based on his 1.44WHIP.

The Pirates also made some significant moves by releasing Pedro Alvarez and trading away local fan favorite, Neil Walker.

The Pirates struggles continued into 2017 and the team that seemed destined to become a constant postseason threat by having a top 5 MLB team (at least according to record) along with a top 5 farm system was making changes.

Just before New Year's 2018, the two faces of the franchise were traded away within days of each other.

Gerrit Cole was traded to Houston for a package that included Joe Musgrove, Colin Moran, and Jason Martin.

Cutch was shipped off to the San Francisco Giants for Bryan Reynolds and Kyle Crick.

Cole became a different pitcher in Houston and improved his spin rate becoming one of the best pitchers in the game.  

He made the All Star team both seasons in Houston and would lead the American League in K/9 both years.  In his 65 starts with Houston he went 35-10 with a 2.68ERA and 602 strikeouts over 412 innings.  His K/9 jumped from 8.4 with Pittsburgh to 13.1 with Houston.

Following the 2019 World Series, Cole became a Free Agent and signed with the team that originally drafted him.

In 148 innings with the Yankees, Cole alread has struck out nearly 200 batters and has a miniscule 2.54 ERA to go with a 13-6 record. 

In 18 postseason innings with the Yankees last year, Cole struck out 30 batters and won both games he was involved in a decision.

Should I look at other former teammates of Cutch and show off some of my cards with that player?